The question of what makes ‘Nordic’ music distinctive is a matter of some dispute. Does it exist? Or, in what ways is it able to manifest itself? Like nationality, it is a construction of identity that emerges through discourses on music and on Nordicness. Essentially it is an open signifier, as concepts of Nordicness can be identified either with something dark, cold and obscure or as something r

Since N. v. the United Kingdom, an exceptionally high threshold has been applied to migrants who try to avoid expulsion in order to continue to receive medical assistance in the returning state. With Paposhvili v. Belgium, the Grand Chamber of the ECtHR recognized the ensuing protection gap and modified the standards. These modifications imply a small opening of the ‘very exceptional’ standard to

The issue of causation has been surprisingly overlooked in the area of international human rights law. The objective of this article is to fill this gap by investigating how the ECtHR finds causal connections between harm and state omissions within the framework of positive obligations. By engaging with causation, this article seeks to partially address the widely voiced concerns about the indeter

The Council of Europe Convention on Preventing and Combating Violence against Women and Domestic Violence (the Istanbul Convention) is a relatively recent treaty that has the objective to protect women against all forms of violence and to design a comprehensive framework of measures for achieving this aim. Migrant women are of special concern given the awareness that when their migration status is

The populist turn in national and international politics includes one common question across countries: curbing immigration and limiting the rights of migrants. In the light of these restrictive tendencies, the questions that this article seeks to address are: whether and how the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), as interpreted by the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR), can be a poin

Chowdury and Others v Greece reveals the exploitation that migrant workers suffer at agricultural farms for production of strawberries whose sweet taste many of us enjoy. Greece was found in violation of Article 4 of the ECHR (the right not to be subjected to forced labour and human trafficking) for its failure to protect the migrants from the exploitation and to conduct effective investigation. T

Understanding the realities of protection in a Europe that had failed to manage the crisis in asylum that unfolded in 2015 and 2016 requires a comprehension of how law shapes and distorts refugee protection practices in frontline states. In this collection Vladislava Stoyanova and Eleni Karageorgiou provide an essential cartography of the state of asylum during the crisis. The volume captures four

Background: The general population is exposed to phthalates, a group of chemicals with strong evidence for endocrine disrupting properties, commonly used in a large number of consumer products. Based on published research and evidence compiled by environmental agencies, certain phthalate applications and products have become restricted, leading to an increasing number of “new generation compounds”

Innate immunity relies on an effective recognition of the pathogenic microorganism as well as on endogenous danger signals. While bacteria in concert with their secreted virulence factors can cause a number of inflammatory reactions, danger signals released at the site of infection may in addition determine the amplitude of such responses and influence the outcome of the disease. Here, we report t

The main objective was to estimate the frequency of early vascular aging (EVA) in a sample of subjects from Latin America, with emphasis in young adults. We included 1416 subjects from 12 countries in Latin America who provided information about lifestyle, cardiovascular risk factors (CVRF), and anthropometrics. We measured pulse wave velocity (PWV) as a marker of arterial stiffness, and blood pre

Sedan 2000-talet har den Europeiska Unionen (EU) lanserat biodrivmedel som ett alternativ för att uppnå minskad klimatpåverkan men också landsbygdsutveckling i globala Syd. Den kritiska debatten pekar dock på att biodrivmedel snarare försvårar införandet av mer meningsfulla åtgärder för att minska växthusgasutsläpp från transport; samt att utlovade arbetstillfällen lyser med sin frånvaro, samtidigSince the 2000s, the European Union (EU) has promoted biofuels for transport to achieve climate change mitigation, and rural development in the global South. In contrast, critiques have argued that biofuel promotion impedes more meaningful mitigation while also resulting in dispossession of land and loss of labour opportunities in the global South. In this thesis, I study why the EU is promoting l

Background:Transcriptomic profiles have shown promise as predictors of response to neoadjuvant chemotherapy in breast cancer (BC). This study aimed to explore their predictive value in the advanced BC (ABC) setting.Methods:In a Phase 3 trial of first-line chemotherapy in ABC, a fine needle aspiration biopsy (FNAB) was obtained at baseline. Intrinsic molecular subtypes and gene modules related to i

Background Renal elimination normally decreases with age. Nonsteroidal antiinflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) carry a risk of additional kidney damage. Objective The aims of this study were to assess the prevalence of NSAIDs in the elderly (aged ≥ 65) population in Sweden, explore reasons for any possible differences in the level of use and assess their kidney functions. Setting Data were obtained from t